Superwoman was helpless on her knees, her magnificent body trembling, the power of The Traveler’s crystal a constant, searing fire in her veins. Eddie Winter stood over her, his heavy, meaty fists rising and falling in a brutal, punishing rhythm. Superwoman’s grunts of pain made him smile. She was weak and suffering, but still defiant. “Y…you won’t…get away with this Eddie.” She managed to stutter out in her pain wrecked body. Eddie laughed at the defeated beauty in red. “You don’t know when you’re beat do ya bitch?” He replied slapping her face so hard she fell to the floor. “You’re nothing now bitch!” He yelled as he kicked the helpless champion of Delta City. He took special note of the pained moans that escaped her lips and the way her perfect face twisted in agony with each impact.

“See that, Detective?!” Eddie roared across the room to a gagged and struggling Rebecca Hunt. “See your hero?! She’s nothing! Just another bitch on her knees, waiting for a man to tell her what she is!”

Rebecca thrashed in her chair, muffled screams of pure rage lost behind the thick cloth, tears of helpless fury streaming down her face as she watched her best friend be dismantled.

Eddie grabbed Superwoman by her dark, silky hair and threw her across the room. She crashed onto his large mahogany desk, scattering papers and sending a heavy crystal decanter shattering to the floor. Before she could even try to push herself up, he was on her, a predator savoring his prize. He watched as her pantyhose encased leg dangled uselessly off his desk. He grabbed her red leather booted ankle and worked his meaty hands to the zipper. He slowly unzipped the iconic red boot and slipped it off slowly. Her perfect pantyhose foot exposed to the air. He rubbed his big hands on her foot and felt the slight dampness from the boot. Dropping the foot he reached for the other boot. “No…” was the only defense she could manage as her feet were laid bare for Eddie’s amusement. 

Eddie was high on the ecstasy of his victory over Superwoman. He knew he was going to fuck her before he killed her. He wanted her to suffer the humiliation of forced penetration before she died. He was suddenly pulled out of his very real fantasy by The Traveler. 

“The belt and choker, Eddie. Now.” The Traveler’s voice was cold and impatient from the doorway to the library. The voice of a man who knew this once in a lifetime opportunity to achieve his goals should not be squandered. 

“In a minute, Traveler.” Eddie growled, still leering at the broken woman helpless before him. “I paid for a show. I’m getting my money’s worth.” He said. He felt invincible and he didn’t like The Traveler interrupting his revenge session. Besides, Eddie just took Superwoman off the board. Traveler and his science experiment could wait.

“We have a deal,” The Traveler insisted, his voice dropping. “The artifacts, or the crystal gets turned off and she breaks you in half.”

Eddie was quickly reminded The Traveler has the power to stop his party. With a final, frustrated sneer, Eddie ripped the belt and choker from Superwoman’s body and tossed them to the armored man. “Here. Take your damn jewelry.”

The Traveler caught them and disappeared into the adjoining library. He placed the artifacts on a pedestal and activated his Quantum Compass. A low hum filled the room as a faint, crimson energy began to flow from the gems into the rune-etched device, which began to glow with a faint, cosmic light. But the flow was a mere trickle. The Compass’s power reading barely climbed to 10%. The Traveler scowled. The artifacts were still psychically linked to their host. He needed to sever that connection permanently.

He strode back into the office. “Kill her, Eddie. Now. I cannot access the full power until she is dead.”

Eddie, who was in the middle of another brutal assault, looked up, annoyed. “Relax, I’ll get to it when I’m done having my fun.” After more prodding from the impatient Traveler, he finally sighed. He grabbed Superwoman from the desk and threw her to the floor. He knelt, his powerful hands wrapping around her throat, and began to squeeze. He looked into Superwoman’s terrified eyes behind the iconic red mask. Her hands weakly grabbing at his thick wrists. Her mouth open and gasping for air. “Guess I’ll fuck your corpse instead.” He said with gleeful vengeance in his voice. 

“Watch closely, Detective!” he gloated to Rebecca. “I want you to see the light go out of her eyes! Watch a legend die by my hand!”

Superwoman’s vision began to tunnel to black. Her lungs burned. All hope was lost. This is how Superwoman dies. Not from an epic battle by the hands of a worthy adversary, but by the hands of an average man who got lucky. 

Suddenly, the temperature in the room plummeted. The thrumming sound of crackling mystical energy filled the room.  The air in the center of the office tore open into a swirling, chaotic vortex of deep purples and blacks, crackling with raw, untamed magical energy. A pair of black leather combat boots with legs draped in black fishnet stepped through first. A beautiful woman with blue hair and a red corset stepped through. It was Majick. She had arrived to investigate the energy anomaly generated when the Quantum Compass was fed energy. 

She took in the scene in an instant. “Wow, a big, tough man strangling a helpless woman,” she said, her voice dripping with sarcastic venom. Her gaze flicked to the open box on the desk containing The Traveler’s blue crystal. She scoffed. “Oh, cute. Someone made a knock-off of my work. It’s hideous, by the way.”

With a casual flick of her wrist, the crystal flew into its box, which snapped shut, and was immediately tossed back into a new, tiny portal which she closed. “Trash belongs in the bin.”  

The Traveler stared in shock from the library doorway. “The Supreme Witch…” he said to himself and fled back inside. Majick turned her attention to Rebecca. “Hi Rebecca.” She said with a knowing smile. Majick flicked her other wrist. The ropes and gag binding Rebecca turned to dust. “Do your thing queen.” she said simply.

Freed from the crystal’s agonizing influence, Superwoman gasped for air. She began to fight back with the strength of an ordinary woman. She manged to get his hands off her throat while kicking her legs fiercely. Rebecca, meanwhile, launched herself at Eddie Winter with a furious roar, tackling him away from her friend.

Superwoman focused her will. “Come to me!” she thought. In the library, the artifacts exploded from The Traveler’s hands, tore through the wall, and slammed back into place around her neck and waist. Power, glorious and whole, flooded her being.

As she rose to her feet, Eddie’s crew, Vito and Carlo among them, drew their weapons. The brawl erupted.

Rebecca, a storm of pent-up fury, moved with the brutal efficiency of a cornered lion. She sidestepped a clumsy punch from Vito, driving her elbow hard into his throat and sending him down, gasping. Two more thugs charged her; she used their own momentum, redirecting one into the other with a hip toss that sent them both crashing into a liquor cabinet in a shower of expensive glass.

Superwoman, now a goddess of vengeance, moved with a speed that was almost impossible to follow. Carlo Deluca fired his pistol; she caught the bullet between her fingers an inch from her face, her expression one of cold contempt. She squeezed, and the bullet flattened into a useless disc. “My turn,” she said, and with a single, open-palmed strike, sent him flying across the room. Her magnificent body, a moment ago a portrait of suffering, was now a flawless instrument of absolute power.

Finally, only Eddie Winter was left standing and now stood panting, staring in horror as the fully-powered Superwoman advanced on him, her eyes glowing with a faint crimson light.

“No… stay back!” he stammered.

She didn’t reply. She moved in a blur. Before he could even finish his sentence, she was there. A single, contemptuous backhand strike connected with his jaw. The sound was like a thunderclap, and the gang boss was lifted from his feet, flying across the room to crash into the far wall, where he slumped to the floor, instantly unconscious.

With the room secured, the three women converged on the library. Majick had The Traveler cornered.

He smiled. “A temporary setback.” He tapped a keypad on his arm computer. A massive, holographic display of the Multiverse filled the room.

“Onboard AI,” he commanded. “Initiate Quantum Compass.”

“Destination required,” a synthesized voice replied.

“Anywhere. Just go.”

“Warning: Power at ten percent. Sufficient only for a one-way, randomized journey. There will be no return.”

“Activate the damn compass!” he roared.

“NO!” Majick screamed, lunging for him.

But it was too late. In a blink of silent, imploding light, The Traveler vanished, gone from their reality, a new and unknown threat now unleashed upon the Multiverse.

Superwoman: Ice Cold Winter – Epilogue

A week later, a sense of calm had finally returned to Delta City. In the pristine, private office of the District Attorney, Josephine Crimea looked out at her city, a content smile on her face. Across from her desk, Detective Rebecca Hunt leaned back in a chair, her feet propped up on the corner. Majick stood by the large window, observing the peaceful streets below.

“It’s done,” Rebecca said, a tone of deep, weary satisfaction in her voice. “With Sal’s confession, Superwoman’s testimony, and the evidence we recovered from the mansion, a federal task force has completely dismantled the Winter Ave Gang from the top down. Eddie and his entire command structure are going to  Supermax Prison. They’re finished. Permanently.”

“It’s a good win, Becca,” Josephine said. “A clean win for the city.”

Majick turned from the window, her expression thoughtful. “For this city, maybe,” she said quietly. “But a door was opened. A piece of the game is now on a different board.”

The other two knew exactly who she meant.

Elsewhere…

The Traveler blinked into existence with a gut-wrenching lurch, crashing into a pile of overflowing trash cans in a dark, rain-slicked alley. His sophisticated armor was damaged, and the Quantum Compass on his arm was completely dark, its power core depleted. He was stranded.

He pushed himself up, his body aching. This was Earth, he could tell, but it was… different. The architecture of the buildings was harsher, more monolithic. And the posters plastered on the alley walls were deeply unsettling. They showed the face of a Superwoman, but her expression was not one of hope; it was a stern, authoritarian glare. Beneath her image, in a bold, imposing font, were the words: OBEDIENCE IS STRENGTH. ORDER IS JUSTICE.

“Fascinating,” he muttered to himself, a slow, analytical smile spreading across his face. He correctly deduced that the Superwoman of this Earth, A-487, was a fascist dictator.

Suddenly, the air beside him tore open into a swirling vortex of purple and black energy. A woman with blue hair and a red corset stepped through.

The Traveler’s blood ran cold. He scrambled backward, his hand instinctively going for a weapon that wasn’t there. “How?!” he stammered, his mind racing. “How did you follow me?!”

The woman, Majick, just looked at him with an expression of pure, wary confusion. “Follow you? I was tracking the temporal energy spike from your arrival. Who in the hell are you?”

He froze, realizing his mistake. This wasn’t his Majick. This was the Majick of this Earth. An opportunity. He immediately changed his demeanor, his panic replaced by the convincing facade of a lost, harmless wanderer.

“Forgive me,” he said, raising his hands in a gesture of peace. “I am… merely a traveler. My compass malfunctioned during a journey, and I seem to have run out of power. I am stranded here.”

This Earth’s Majick stared at him, her eyes wide with a mixture of shock and intrigue. “A multiversal traveler… I thought that was just a theory.” Her expression quickly hardened with a new urgency. “But if I could track your energy signature, that means her secret police did, too. The Justicars. They’ll be here in minutes, and they don’t ask questions.”

She looked him up and down, a quick, tactical assessment. “You’re a loose end she will want to eliminate. I don’t know who you are, or if I can trust you, but I don’t leave rogue variables for a tyrant to play with.”

She raised her tattooed hand, and a new, stable portal opened beside her, showing a view of a cluttered, candle-lit arcane workshop.

“Come with me if you want to live,” she said, her voice a low, serious command.

The Traveler, a master manipulator seeing a new, powerful, and perhaps naive piece on a brand new chessboard, gave her a small, grateful smile. He stepped through her portal into a new world of possibilities, his own game far from over.